CAP 15 CAP 4 - Playtest [Done! See Post #71]

So, I've been observing the various Aurumoth sets and I've come to the conclusion that, due to the fact that it has such a variety movesets due to an insanely good movepool, I would say that it's OP. It's too good, in short. Any pokemon that gets Tail Glow, with good stats AND an amazing movepool is automatically recorded as a legend, but on top of that it gets QD and DD which make the unpredictability of Aurumoth an amazing asset that adds to the OPness of this pokemon. Also, the fact that it gets Illusion increases the amazingness of Aurumoth, due to being able to get a free buff, providing you have the right pokemon in last place, and if you're lucky, maybe even two free buffs, which on Aurumoth is basically gg. Teamed up with Heatran and Dugtrio, it makes this pokemon even greater because of the possibilities that you could run with it. If Blaziken was banned, so should Aurumoth.

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We are just over 40 hours into the playtest that is expected to last around 336 hours. 40 / 336 ~ 0.119. We are around 12% into the duration of the playtest, and you feel enough information has been gathered to demand the banning of a CAP from CAP, the only place you can use CAP.

You know what I have found out? If someone is running a pokemon that is faster than Aurumoth and has a Special Move in its set, Aurumoth is dead. I have found that there are not a lot of pokemon that do have difficulties dealing with Aurumoth. Of course, this is not definitive, since we are only about 12% of the way through the playtest, and any claims would be premature and without adequate education or experience.

Blaziken's banning had a bit more testing done to it than 40 hours.

Right now, we need to test out Aurumoth and examine its impact on the metagame. More tests need to be run. More sets need to be attempted. More teams need to be used. We cannot know just how strong Aurumoth really is in 40 hours.

I am trying to test out Weak Armor at the moment. Seem to be running into issues with multi-hit move users.

I've been using Aurumoth as a lure for steels so I can give Salamence a clean sweep, and it's pretty effective in that role. Disguising it as Mence doesn't really lead to much suspicion unless Spikes are up, Close Combat coming from a band boosted base 120 attack puts serious dents into them, severely limiting their ability to check Moxie DD Mence. Not to mention Overheat absolutely smashes Skarmory and Scizor. It really makes people think twice about using their steels, they have to really ask themselves "am I really willing to switch into what might be a Close Combat/Overheat?"

QD Illusion was a cool set to run but I found myself stopped cold by ghosts like Cofagirus (I think that's it) and Dusclops too often. Hydro Pump might be a better help since I was running QD/Bug Buzz/Psyshock/Focus Blast but who knows? I might need to test it a bit more.

Illusion is a godsend for Aurumoth, since it's too slow to take advantage of setting up otherwise. No Guard is a fun ability but I haven't really used it and while weak armor does really stick to the risky business concept, it doesn't really see much use for good reason. The other options are just so much more superior. It's not particularly overpowered, but it's definitely a powerful pokemon.

And Heatran is definitely the MVP of my playtest team so far, it's so antimeta.

I have not found Aurumoth to be broken, althhough the pressure a team with Aurumoth and Zoroark can put on you is amazing. You have to calculate the possibiliy of the pokemon your facing being 3 at ones. The set I have tried the most is quiver dance moth with illusion, but I have found that its low special defence really limites the amount it can set up. I might just go and try it on sun next, as I never used hydro pump, even on a rain team.

I've been using defensive Aurumoth, and it's great. Dragon Dance is really good as well. I haven't seen too many Weak Armor Aurum though. Kinda sad that the first ability picked is outclassed...oh well. Double Illusion teams are fun, but it's hard to pull off unless its after a KO.

I'm loving Scarfmie in this playtest with so many Aurumoth trying to get to +1 and all the Scarf Genesect buzzing around.

Now if only Hydro Pump didn't miss against Illusion sets... Might just switch to Surf. Problem is Rain Boosted Hydro Pump does 63.98 - 75.64% to the +1 Sp Def 100 HP Aurumoth and Surf only does 50.51 - 59.84%.

I've been testing Aurumoth for a while in a rain team (which peaked 1# -made in 3 min-) and have to say that it doesn't behave like i though it would:

First, it's stabs are useless (it's not a volcarona) in qd sets, no guard with thunder/blizzard/focusblast are way better then keeping bug buzz or using hydro pump ( do you really need more water attacks in a rain team?), unless you really want to be walled by jello/ferro/dragons. Meanwhile dd sets are walled by skarmory no matter if they use close combat or not.

Second, Aurumoth is not a risky pokemon, not close to be. it's way to use is to put it in front of something that can't do much to it, and it's kinda easy to set up on things as it has huge physical bulk. Just like aggainst ferro in which Aurumoth can easily take 2 gyro balls or survive a brave bird from skarmory giving it time to set up one or more quiver dances and make an easy sweep. So due to it's bulk it's hardly need prediction or hide aurumoth with illusion (even if it might get more boosts). So no guard is just the best option.

Third, whoever is running scarf ninetales is totally crazy, but liked the idea. And please STOP USING GENESECT as it's broken and will be banned soon, it's not a good idea to test aurumoth with genesect and when aurumoth is finally released genesect is banned changing the entire metagame.

Overall I would say aurumoth is just too bulky and is easily revenge killed by fast scarfs, it's like a strange bug-type dragonite. Maybe with higher attack to make dd set's harder to stop and better speed while having less defense would make it fit it's objective as a high risk high reward poke. I hope that the critics were constructive but i have to agree take this cap was simple one the best caps in aesthetics and even if it didn't fit it's primary roll it's a nice bulky set up sweeper.

Hello smogon, this is my first post. Even though I've been playing pokemon for over a year, I only just registered with smogon, partially to discuss this playtest. Many of the above posters have battled me under the username garchomporus 2 on showdown.

I peaked at number 4 with a substitute moxie gyarados centered team. Almost every game ended in a moxie gyarados sweep, partially due to the huge influx of fast but often weak or frail scarfers, along with plenty of heatran, giving gyarados tons of set up opportunities. It can even check aurumoth with bounce if the moth lacks thunder(bolt). The team did employ a quiver dance aurumoth, but it rarely swept, so I gave it no gaurd will-o-wisp over bug buzz and was very pleased with the result, crippling ferrothorn, genesect (on the switch), and dragonite. The moth's offenses weren't special, it was it's phsyical defense that made it good, and it's special defense that crippled it, even with quiver dance. Illusion actually rarely helped it when I used it, if anything it helped ellimanate a gyarados counter some of the time. As for it's overall effect on the metagame, I don't think it will really change it in the slighest further down the road. It promotes fast powerful scarfers, and to some degree, bulky pokemon with specific roles to fill that can double as checks, like weather summoners, or hazard contollers. Basicallyy we'll be back where we started, too many scarfers, too much emphasis on weather, and too many genesects (try specially defensive conkeldurr, it's an excellent counter).

Tomorrow I will try a new set with quiver dance and 252 special defense evs to take special hits better, because the boost those evs give to a 60 base stat is huge, about a 50% boost. It could allow it to take hits from scarf stamie much better. Anyway, it's late, I've said too much, and you are probably getting sick of reading about how great gyarados is, so hello again, smogon, and best of luck to everyone on the playtest!

the evs to outspeed base 100 pokes with neutral nature, maybe i give it full speed to outspeed scarf gene, but i dont see it that often.
i use this set in rain, and i am faking to be a terrakion.
the shoul send in their counter and get smashed by a +1 hydropump.
against blissey, jellicent and friends coming in after i added tailglow as "coverage" to muscle through and sweep later on.

i like it a lot especially the illusion on a more viable mon than zoruark.

So after lurking all the way through CAP4, I decided to go test Aurumoth out on the ladder. Its really a joy to play and, if anything, it proves how powerful Illusion is on a good mon. I find Keldeo to be a pretty nice partner to it in rain, although the five minute set up time makes it pretty clear to your opponent that it has Illusion.

The thing is though, it doesn't seem risky to play. It has massive physical bulk so all you have to do is bring it out on a physical attacker that can't really harm it. If they attack, then yay free set up. If they see through the illusion? You still get a chance to boost or attack on the switch and, with Aurumoth's movepool, this can be enough.

I guess thats the thing - Aurumoth forces risk more on your opponent, not on you.

One thing I noticed is that auru's physical movepool seems. . . lacking. I tried to use a weak armor set with choice band and noticed that beyond the usual megahorn/zen headbutt/cc trio it's limited to friggin' return/frusturation and facade.

I have a few points to discuss about the playtest thus far. First off, I have tested the new aurumoth spread with 252 special defense evs. It resulted in a pokemon that just won't die. Here is the exact set I used and some calcs:

As you can see it really helps Aurumoth live through some major hits, making revenge killing without a genesect difficult. It also really helps the moth engage in calm mind/quiver dance wars, since taking latias' hits is now much easier, although bug buzz may be of some use on the set if that is its intended purpose.

Secondly, I would like to comment on the moth's performance in relation to its purpose. Simply put, it is not a risky high reward mon, because it has insane physical, good (invested) special bulk, and typing that doesn't lend itself toward fighting/setting up on any particular group of ou pokemon. It also cannot really sweep with one boost, at least not cleanly. Instead it either sets up more boosts with its bulk, or simply lives through its revenge killers' attempts to hurt it. Status seems to be the best way to deal with the moth, so maybe lum berry or substitute would be viable options. Anyway, one interesting way (and I know everyone will freak out or point me to some discussion I haven't looked at) to make the moth fulfill its purpose would be to give it shell smash, probably alongside lowered physical defense. This would limit it to one good sweep, and make it think a great deal about what sort of item best fits its team, based on which pokemon it can disguise itself as, and how well its team handles priority moves (as of now though the moth is practically immune to priority thanks to that massive defense). Lum berry, white herb, and life orb would be obvious item choices. I realize that this will limit its diversity, but it would make the illusion guessing game much more important, and, of course, riskier.

Thirdly, on the subject of abilities, I, like sanches br, have found no guard to be best with a wide array of coverage. The moveset hits most of ou hard, and while it is rather easily walled by specially defensive pokemon not weak to its moves, those pokemon are sort of non-existent in the playtest. Illusion just isn't worth the awesome super effective hits aurumoth can get using the above set, at least in my opinion, especially since everyone has a solid moth counter for when the game is up. Weak armor is sadly, most worthless. The huge defenses are all that seperate aurumoth form its fellow sweepers much of the time, so giving that up really isn't the best move.

CAP Head Mod

Was able to jump on the ladder for the first time today; it was a lot of fun. Currently, I'm running a No Guard + Thunder / Blizzard set in the sun for some really interesting coverage that most sun teams don't normally have. Illusion would be a lot better if Choice Scarf U-turn wasn't running all over the place, in my opinion. Aurumoth is definitely a strong Pokemon, but if you're feeling weak to it, I'd recommend more U-turn on your team.

Also, I don't buy the myth that DD is better than QD. QD is such a fantastic move that really patches up Aurumoth's biggest weakness: it's Special Defense. I know special walls are hard to bust through, but just run a bunch of physical attackers and you'll be fine.

Bulky qd with wish and physically defensive make a great core with chansey. I also run scarf ditto for setup variants.
Willow, megahorn, wish, protect or something else max hp max defense.
Excpect psychic moves to come more often and tomohawk to go up if its released like this.

Pretty sad to say this but auromoth isn't risky at all. I think there's a bad precedent in cap of trying to make strong Pokemon rather than learning from the concept.

However, I'm not saying we haven't learned anything from this cap. We definitely learned that illusion is a truly amazing ability on the right Pokemon if played correctly. I used a sub qd set with hydro pump and psyshock on a pretty shoddy rain stall team and made it to number 6 on the ladder without much of a problem. The team totally relied on auromoth to stay alive in order to have any offensive presence and despite all of that pressure it was very easy to bring in auromoth, set up, and go to work. I haven't tried out any sets utilizing weak armour or no guard yet because it seems obvious illusion+qd is the most effective but I might soon so I can actually make a true comparison

Anyway, one interesting way (and I know everyone will freak out or point me to some discussion I haven't looked at) to make the moth fulfill its purpose would be to give it shell smash, probably alongside lowered physical defense.

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As a note, we can't change anything about the CAP at all. So any suggestions as to how we could "improve" the CAP (and I've seen a few in this thread) are rather meaningless.

Anyway, to those of you who are saying that Aurumoth is "not risky", if you're walking into the playtest with a pre-conceived idea of what "risk" is, then:

a) No, you are not likely to find Aurumoth "risky"
b) You're sort of missing the point

Remember that the point of the exercise was to help us learn more about risk and reward, not to satisfy our pre-existing criteria for what a risky Pokemon constitutes. If that were the case, we'd have just made Staraptor 2.0 - not being very good except in specific circumstances, or dying quickly in this case, is not necessarily the only form that risk can take. Or maybe it is, and that's what this playtest will tell us. But let's kindly not jump to conclusions immediately purely because Aurumoth isn't necessarily only of any use in uncommon situations. The design of the Pokemon was to be an actually competitively viable risk-based Pokemon - or rather, one that didn't rely on a single gambit for its effectiveness, as that says more about the strategy than the Pokemon.

In any case, the "point" to Aurumoth, as I saw it in the design phase, was to give us a Pokemon that could run any number of effective sets, but crucially, the less ordinarily competitively viable ones would hold an advantage to them that mitigated the potential downfall, or risk, of using them in the first place. Hence, a risk in incorporating Aurumoth rather than using it. So far, I have seen plenty of Quiver Dancers, a few Scarf Gambit users and something that might have had a physical move, before I killed it. So I think I can say that Aurumoth has a standardised set core. I have also noted that a standard Quiver Dancer, for all its merits, is somewhat underwhelming as a sweeper - competent, but not stellar. Scarf Gambit is either a game-winner or a waste of space, depending on how I play it.

This is partly the reason why I want to encourage people to experiment - I'd like to see if going with an unorthodox set, or something of that ilk, can be consistent enough to run despite not being, objectively speaking, Aurumoth's "best set ever". Remember that inconsistency is a large part of why "risky" Pokemon are rarely used, but that it doesn't have to be a staple feature of a risky Pokemon. See Cloyster, or Volcarona.

Case in point - this set has a severe power drain and pretty much flat-out loses to anything remotely specially defensive - see SpD or CM Jirachi said:
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I guess thats the thing - Aurumoth forces risk more on your opponent, not on you.

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I'd say it does both, but this is a good observation, all the same. I've found nearly anything with Earthquake to be almost a liability to me now, largely because I'm taking such pains to prepare against an Aurumoth sweep (which means I should probably take that Landorus off my team now...)

As far as abilities go, I'm happy to see that No Guard and Illusion both have their little niches. Illusion in particular appears to make a hecktonne of strategies viable that wouldn't be nearly as good otherwise - WishPass, Final Gambit, that sort of thing. Rather sad to see nobody liking Weak Armour quite as much - I suppose it was to be expected really. Even so, I've had times where I would have sorely liked that extra little bit of Speed on top of a Quiver Dance boost to outrun that one pesky Genesect that would never die. I'd be very interested to see if somebody could find a consistent set that incorporated it - all the sets I've tried or dreamed up thus far are far less consistent than No Guard or Illusion variants of the same.

Moderator

Also, I don't buy the myth that DD is better than QD. QD is such a fantastic move that really patches up Aurumoth's biggest weakness: it's Special Defense. I know special walls are hard to bust through, but just run a bunch of physical attackers and you'll be fine.

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As one of the people who thinks that DD is superior, I just want to say that while all that you say is true, I don't think it is the right way to look at it. In isolation, not looking at the metagame, QD vastly outstrips DD. I have do doubt about that. However, QD sets have major flaws that DD ones do not. DD is significantly easier to use with Illusion. The partners that it works with are better, and it functions better with them, and thus has an easier time setting up. In addition, as you mentioned, Special Walls are hard to break. This really can't be said of physical walls. Once you get set up, QD might be harder to revenge, but it is much easier to wall. DD can't really be walled like that at all. And even with a boost, revenging in this metagame is not too difficult. You need multiple SpD boosts to stop that, but getting multiple boosts with either is essentially game over, and Dragon Dance has an easier time achieving that.

I don't doubt the power of QD, and yes, as you say, you could just run a bunch of physical attackers to mitigate its shortcomings, but that is unnecessarily restrictive. DD does not need such support to be successful. Basically, while QD as a general idea is superior, in the metagame we have, I have little doubt that DD fits in better. Of course "better" is the key word, both are highly dangerous, and both are fantastic in OU.

That being said, I all that I have said so far is regarding a Dance + 3 attacks set. One of the neat things that QD can do better than anything else are 2 attack sets. Because it has problems with walls, but also has a wide variety of moves to work with, it is much less hesitant to give up one attack slot for a support move. I have seen things like QD + WoW and QD + Wish be used to great success. So while it may not be best at straight up sweeping, QD comes with a level of versatility the physical sets cannot match.

So, maybe overall QD is the better move for Aurumoth, but on comparable offensive sets, I'll take DD over QD any day.

Bugmanciac Bob, thanks for the reply. Sorry about the shell smash thing, I didn't mean to go off topic. On the subject of risk, you bring up an interesting point. Risk is not inherent to only the battlefield. After all, don't all great warriors win before they begin to fight? The way most sweepers (especially the likes of cloyster and volcorana) apply risk to team building is by requiring a lot of support to function, with a deadly attempt on the health of the opponent’s whole team as a reward for this opportunity cost. If you fail in this attempt, you will be stuck desperately wondering how a ninetales, an xatu, and a dugtrio can possibly take down the opponent. Aurumoth plays a very different game.

Since they are both easy to set up, and easy to hit (koing is another story) after they set up, they really don't demand the same risk from the user. The reward is comparatively smaller, but the so is the payoff since an aurumoth is less likely to ko everything on the opponent's team than a volcorana is. This puts the risk on the opponent. They must consider how much an aurumoth can set up on each team member, and how much damage aurumoth can do after setting up. Against most fast but weaker attackers (starmie, alakazam, dugtrio), one-two boosts at mid to low health can be obtained. Against strong attackers (landorus, magnezone, dragonite, offensive politoed) generally only one can be obtained at low health. Walls and scarfers are more complex as the boosts they offer are situational, but generally scarfers locked into the wrong move can be forced out (true with any sweeper), and walls can generally only chip away or status the moth(of course some wall it to death). This forces the player to pack appropriate responses to what his pokemon will allow in terms of set up. You are probably going to say this is true of any pokemon, and it is, but what makes aurumoth exemplify this defensive teambuilding risk so well is that it can easily set up thanks to its bulk and illusion, can be hurt by almost every pokemon to some extent, and does not possess 100% offensive stops since most choice scarfers and priority won't ko it, unlike with dragons and ice shard, or terrakion with bullet punch. This makes it a very interesting pokemon to play against, and actually does teach the concept of risk very well. I realize I am mostly talking about the quiver dance sets, but I really haven't played around enough with the others to know their value, but I think I can safely say what I said is still relevant since quivere dance will probably be the most prominent variant

Also, about my set, I realize it is easily walled (but it does hit all but 20 pokemon in ou super effectively), but that set isn't a wall breaker. Against stall it is basically worthless. It is designed to function well against offensive teams that use special attackers to handle aurumoth. It can set up in many opportunities the other sets cannot, and it also happens to defeat any offensive heatran besides specs switching into quiver dance by 2hkoing it with focus blast and avoiding an ohko in return. Try it with some stall breakers, and it may surprise you with its ability to nab a quiver dance in tight spots.

Also, I don't buy the myth that DD is better than QD. QD is such a fantastic move that really patches up Aurumoth's biggest weakness: it's Special Defense. I know special walls are hard to bust through, but just run a bunch of physical attackers and you'll be fine.

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O.K, I don't join in the playtest, so my viewpoint of this doesn't matter as much, but it seems like this is the reason Aurumoth isn't risky. Quiver Dance patches up the Special Defence? Then where's the risk involved in the pokemon?

Moderator

Man Aurumoth is completely ridiculous from a few test matches. It's basically a Volcarona without the 4x SR weakness.

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Bold emphasis mine.

I've seen quite a few people, myself included, fall into this mindset due to having a few good matches with Aurumoth to start off. Please don't let your opinion of Aurumoth be tainted just because it did well in a few test matches. I know my opinion of it sure as hell changed after 30 matches or so.

And please for the love of Arceus remember we're here to learn, not say how broken/notbroken Aurumoth is.

The riskymon is not necessarily supposed to hold blatant risk. Rather, it is the examination of the role of risk in the metagame. It has succeeded in this job, since we all had risk in mind during its creation.

Gotta say, with the few games I've had so far its pretty effective, nobody sees the Charti coming and all of a sudden you have an easy one turn setup that outspeeds the whole unboosted metaand hits it really hard. Its easy to get in at least one KO, but obviously Weak Armor gives a vulnerability to priority. Pretty sure you could run it with another berry or a different boosting move, but I'm just throwing the idea out there.